I love the Railgun. It’s obviously my defining thing. I would even call it Halo’s blunderbuss. It hits like a brick, and it takes no prisoners. Infantry and vehicles go down like flies, and even if it doesn’t kill them instantly, the sheer amount of destruction left behind makes it my favourite weapon. A while back, I was all over a prior Railgun thread where I dumped out a good chunk of my knowledge on how to use it. But since I don’t want to take over that one thread, I’ll expand myself on this one instead. Without further delay, let’s begin.
Tricks:
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You don’t have to charge the Railgun all the way. This is a basic tactic with the weapon, but an important one too. Under normal circumstances, the weapon will fire by itself as you hold the trigger after a period of time. But you don’t have wait this long. As you charge the Railgun, the reticule will eventually shrink to a smaller size. This is your visual indicator that the weapon is ready to fire. When this happens, simply let go of the trigger and things go boom. This simple trick allows for more direct engagements without having to preemptively charge the weapon.
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You can cut down on the Railgun’s reload process. This is my secret trick which has made me so dangerous with the weapon, and has proved decisive in engagements where I faced multiple opponents at once. After firing the Railgun, pay close attention to the ammo counter at the top-right of your HUD as you reload. When it goes from red (empty) to blue (loaded), you can cancel the reload process by doing the following:
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A very short sprint (resets shield recharge) - Using your thruster evade - Y-Y’ing - Throwing a grenade (can increase your damage output if thrown well) - Clambering (must be well-timed and near a convenient ledge) - A melee attack (not recommended normally)If you cancel the reload correctly, your character won’t have to shut the Railgun’s breach by hand, as it will close on its own. It’s a little tricky to practice, but the payoff is very much worth it. This allows you to prepare more shots against multiple enemy players / vehicles in a shorter amount of time. As a bonus, this reloading trick also (only) works with all magazine-fed weapons, including the Shotgun, Scattershot, Grenade Launcher, Fuel Rod, and even the Rocket Launcher. It is important to note that the Carbine and Lightrifle gain the smallest benefits compared to the rest. Battery-based weapons like the Incineration Cannon are completely unaffected by the trick, as their cooldown cannot be shortened.By putting these two tricks together, you can increase the Railgun’s rate of fire and damage output dramatically, which makes it so deadly in the right hands, let alone mine. Now we get to the fun stuff…the testing! I wanted to know how much of a difference the aforementioned tricks would make, so I conducted some experiments in Forge. With some difficulty, I’ve successfully conducted two; one with the standard Railgun, and the other with the Whiplash. There will be two links - one for the Content Browser, and the other to Xboxdvr.com - should one link doesn’t work properly.
Test 1: Standard Railgun
An Urban Scorpion (Woodland and Tundra can apply) serves as a test target. I’ll be aiming for the side for consistency. Two standard Railguns are placed in front of me, each loaded with a total of 6 rounds. The left-side Railgun will be fired normally, while the right-side Railgun will be fired with the aid of the charging and reload tricks.
By the time I get to the second salvo, you should see (and hear) how much faster I can destroy the Scorpion when compared to the first salvo. Do take note that as I reload, my character isn’t manually shutting the breach by hand.
Test 2: Whiplash
An ONI Scorpion serves as a test target. Like the previous test, I’ll be aiming for the side for consistency. Two Whiplashes will be placed in front of me, both loaded with a total of 10 rounds. The left-side Whiplash will be fired normally, while the right-side Whiplash will be fired with the aid of the charging and reload tricks.
When I get to the second salvo, the fire rate is almost, if not, just as fast as a standard sniper rifle, factoring out the reloads. And again, notice that my character isn’t closing the breach by hand as I reload.
Hope you enjoyed this post; this took a while to make! 